SHERLOCK: The Return
by Lilian Katora
Summary: Takes place 18 months after events of 'The Reichenbach Fall'. John Watson is in denial of the death of Sherlock Holmes. His life is now dull, almost meaningless. Everything changes when a man with a big blue box shows up with news of the great detective.
1. Beginnings

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: I have already started this story, and have left it unfinished but NOT this time. I am starting afresh. The first chapter is more or less the same, but the next chapters will be different. I really want to finish this story. I have a very lazy habit of not finishing stories. So I hope the people who've actually read the story so far will forgive me. **

It was a new day, a new day of new beginnings. John Watson sat in his (he liked to think of it as his) armchair at 221B Baker Street, alone and depressed. He looked on with remorse at the empty couch across the room, thinking that his best friend Sherlock should've been lying there deep in thought. But he wasn't. That was what bothered him. It always bothered him. He'd awake in the morning, walking into the living room, saying aloud "You know Sherlock, there was this thing I have been meaning to say to you and-" and then he'd realize it. The blow would come full on, crushing his puny little heart. There was no Sherlock-Sherlock was no more. He was-John Watson couldn't even bear to even think the words. They were impossible. Preposterous! Inconceivable! Contrary to reason! Mad to think! Impervious! Bewildering! Unfeasible! Compromising!  
The fact of the matter was, John could have gone on and on at how 'impossible' the death of Sherlock Holmes was. He could have written whole essays on why Sherlock Holmes shouldn't be dead. But that would have pillaged him further in denial. His therapist had said to him countless times that change was the one factor that was constant in life. He already knew that yet... yet moving from the memories he held within his mind involving Sherlock was not a trivial matter. Far from it.  
Sherlock Holmes... he knew many people, upon hearing that aberrant name, would either curse aloud to themselves or say a couple of rude remarks during which the time John would either defend his friend on his behalf in a very conventional, polite way or simply punch them in the face. He had done that to someone a while ago.  
_**The Chief SuperIntendant walked in, wearing an expression that John did not like at all.**_  
_**"Donovan," the chief said, standing tall, despite his 'stoutness'. John knew the reason.**_  
_**"Sir," Donovan answered, nodding.**_  
_**"Got our man?"**_  
_**"Er, yes, sir."**_  
_**"Looked a bit of a weirdo, if you ask me." This was about the point where John turned to him, an 'are you kidding me' look on his face. Where did the chief get on about insulting his friend behind his back? Remarkable man, he was.**_  
_**"Often are, these vigilante types," The chief caught him staring. "What are you looking at?" His tone infuriated John further. John pulled back his arm, hand curled in a fist and-**_  
_**A minute or two later, the Chief SuperIntendant walked out of 221B Baker Street holding a handkerchief to a bleeding nose. Of course, John was arrested.**_  
_**With his hands cuffed behind his back, John could see the look of amusement upon Sherlock's features as he was pushed against the police car, the same one Sherlock was leaning against.**_  
_**"Joining me?" he asked, smiling.**_  
_**` "Yeah. Apparently it's against the law to chin the Chief Superintendant." Behind the both of them, a couple of armed officers unlocked the cuffs on Sherlock's right hand, and they transferred it to John's right wrist, chaining the boys together.**_  
_**Sherlock turned to John, whispering "Hmm. Bit awkward, this."**_  
_**"Huh. No one to bail us." John answered, thinking a moment. His companion shook his head decisively.**_  
_**"I was thinking more about our imminent and daring escape." He gestured down at the radio lying on the dashboard of the car they were leaning against. The radio squealed as the dispatcher spoke.**_  
_**"All units to two seven."**_  
_**John furrowed his eyebrows as the impact of Sherlock's words finally reached him to their full potential.**_  
_**"What?" He asserted in a low whisper to avoid being heard by nearby Scotland Yarders.**_  
_**"All units to two..." the dispatcher repeated; just as it did, Sherlock rapidly reached through the open window of the car with his free hand effectively pressing down on the 'talk' button. Instantly, a nearby officer behind the boys doubled over in pain, grabbing at his earpiece as a high-pitched squeal of feedback ripped through it. John's brilliant friend reached behind him and pulled the officer's pistol free, raising it. John gasped in surprise when his right hand was yanked upwards as well, and also at the rapid turn of events.**_  
_**Sherlock called out, aiming the pistol at the nearby officers.**_  
_**"Ladies and gentleman," A commanding tone took place in his voice. "will you all please get on your knees?" When nobody obeyed, Sherlock raised the gun skywards, firing it twice.**_  
_**"NOW would be good!"**_  
_**"Do as he says," Lestrade commanded his officers, gesturing everyone downwards, the police starting to kneel. John raised his eyebrows in surprise at the event. Sherlock and John backed away.**_  
_**Suddenly, John caught on to Sherlock's play. "Just-just so you're aware, the gun is his idea. I'm just a...you know..." He began nervously, grinning madly inside in excitement. Oh, the things Sherlock came up with!**_  
_**Sherlock finished John's sentence rather proudly. "My hostage." The boldness was evident there.**_  
_**John turned to Sherlock, and quietly murmured "Hostage! Yes, that works-that works!"**_  
John chuckled softly, quite retrospectively. He never would have admitted it aloud, but he secretly loved the thrills of the dangerous cases Sherlock would solve-with help from himself of course. He loved how his life never was boring. It was...amazing.  
Unfortunately however, nowadays...all there was was dullness. John, once in elementary school had read a sonnet written by the great man himself. Shakespeare. He recalled a particular line.  
"...He may wander from his natural kind. So shall it be great hurt unto us twain, And yours the loss and mine the deadly pain." He forgot what sonnet it was though-when he first read them at the time, they had sounded a bit too dramatic for his liking but presently...those words killed him. John had never been a poet. Poetry was just something that had never entirely connected with him. It was so...  
Before John could think of an excellent word to match his opinion on poetry, there was a rapid knock on the door. Mrs. Hudson (she had grieved for Sherlock, though not quite as much as John had and was slowly starting to move on from his death) answered with a polite hello; there was an exclamation, an enunciated rush of words and suddenly the sound of someone ascending the stairs 3 steps at a time. John was startled when the door banged open and a man dressed in old man's clothes (probably for a laugh though at the moment he was far from having the desire to laugh) a tweed jacket and an odd coloured blue bowtie, barged in, brown hair all over the place, sticking up in some places as if he had just gotten electrified.  
"You," the man pointed a long finger at him, nearly touching John's nose in his apparent excitement. "Doctor John Watson, come along with me," the man ran out before you could say 'Calculus'. Who the hell had been that bloke?  
"John," breathed Mrs. Hudson rather deeply, catching her breath. "I'm so sorry, he just ran past me and-"  
"It's fine Mrs. Hudson." John sat back in his chair, a familiar old feeling creeping back inside him. His eyes reached Mrs. Hudson's and it was as if she knew what he was feeling. With a slight nod from her, John Watson jumped from his chair, grabbing his coat, and ran out the door, out of 221B Baker Street without a moment's thought. The danger had been evident in that quizzical looking man's eyes. Since danger and excitement had been deprived from him these last few months, John would take any chance to jump right back in the game, in remembrance of the old days, solving crimes with the great detective Sherlock Holmes.


	2. In the Shadow of Your Heart

_John blinked. _  
"_How did you know about Afghanistan?" The man almost smirked. However, he managed to retain a cool and impassive expression. _  
"_I've got my eye on a nice little flat in Central London, we ought to be able to afford it. We meet there tomorrow evening, seven o'clock. Sorry, got to dash. I think I left my riding crop in the mortuary." John furrowed his brow in confusion as the enigmatic man brushed past him, nearly out the door. Riding crop?_  
"_Is that it?" John said to him, regaining his grip on reality. _  
"_Is that what?"_  
"_We've only just met and we're going to look at a flat." Curiously, the man seemed indifferent to John's questions and confusion. _  
"_Problem?"_  
_John sighed. "We don't know a thing about each other. I don't know where we're meeting. I don't even know your name." There was a second of silence. It was the kind of silence right before the deep plunge. John's breath hitched in his throat as the stranger spoke._  
"_I know you're an army doctor and you've been invalided home from Afghanistan. I know you've got a brother who's worried about you, but you won't go to him for help because you don't approve of him-possibly because he's an alcoholic more likely because he recently walked out on his wife. And I know that your therapist thinks your limp's pyschosomatic, quite correctly, I'm afraid. That's enough to be going on with, don't you think?" The man left but evidently hastened to return once he had realized what he had forgotten._  
"_The name's Sherlock Holmes and the address is 221b Baker street. Afternoon." With a wink, Sherlock Holmes vanished. _  
That same wonder and bafflement and even amazement that had taken hold of him that day, had the same effect on John in the present moment. The run from his flat had only been a block and yet he was gasping for breath. Obviously, his constitution was in need of a re-evaluation. Staring at the place, awakened in him something primal and deep. Very deep. It was a sense that there were more things in the universe than anyone dared to believe. John believed.  
"You don't need to stand there, mouth all agape. Honestly, you remind me of someone who did the exact same thing. Who was it?" The man that had earlier ran into John's life, was now moving briskly about in his 'box', rambling on something about 'Jim the Fish and his gaping mouth'. John was too stunned to speak.  
"Get in. Get in. Wait. Hold on. I'll be right back." The man with the bowtie left without so much as a wave. John blinked again, hoping that this was some sort of dream. Nope.  
"Bigger on the inside..." he mumbled, head spinning. "Right. Okay." He peered again into the box, eyes roving over the silver roundels covering the vicinity of the curved orange walls. John went out, inspecting the external side of the box. Blue. He tapped on it with his knuckles. Wooden. He checked for any indents, but there was none. He ran back inside and shook his head, completely baffled. Whatever the hell was going on, clearly there was something more than he was being told. And he was being told nothing.  
"Hello?" John called, hoping for the bowtie man to appear again "Hello?" He hated the way his voice echoed across the room.  
"Close the door behind you, eh?" A voice suddenly said above him. John glanced up and nearly gasped. The man was at his console(at least, that's what John thought it was) reading off some kind of monitor.  
"There you are," John breathed, closing the door.  
"Here I am. Hello," The man gave a friendly wave. John waved back, though a little uncertainly.  
"Who are you?" The man paused in his reading, running a hand through the craziness that was his hair. It stuck out even more; John had to suppress a snicker.  
"Oh. Didn't I tell you?" John shook his head. "Guess not. Well, I'm the Doctor. It's very nice to meet you, John Watson."  
"Doctor who, exactly?" The man grinned.  
"Just the Doctor. That's all you will ever call me. Definitely not 'Doc'." 'The Doctor' stretched toward a lever across his console, apparently too lazy to simply walk around and pull it. Something in the way the Doctor moved struck a chord with John. The way he stretched...it seemed almost unnatural. Almost...alien. Before John knew it, he had already blurted out the question.  
"Are you an alien?" A strange laugh emanated from the Doctor. It was a laugh of surprise, but expectation. He finally reached the lever, and right before pulling it, his eyes (which looked curiously old for such a young face) met John's. They crinkled at the corners as he answered, "Yes." Then the world went lopsided and insane, finally becoming blackness.

Life, they said, was a gift. Though at times hectic and alarming, it was certainly wonderful. But at the moment, at least for John Watson, life was nothing but a swirl of memories and a feeling of haziness. He watched as life chugged on, each day and night falling into predictable patterns. Above him, lying across a blanket of stars, was himself, sitting on a small chair, reading the newspaper as usual. A casual observer might have said things were mundane and normal. But behind the newspaper, hiding behind the words and bold headlines, was a face that was the very epitome of pain. Mrs. Hudson could be seen walking up the steps, carrying a tray of tea and biscuits. She set them down on the table, murmuring a soft word or two to John, before touching his shoulder for a brief instant, then turning away to leave.  
John mumbled a polite "Thank you, Mrs. Hudson," as the landlady left. The memory shifted, and John now was in a session with his therapist. Her lips moved, but oddly enough, no sound could be heard. John sat there, staring out the window, quiet tears making their way down his cheeks. Yet another shift in time-this time Christmas Eve. There was Mrs. Hudson, himself, Molly, and Lestrade all gathered round the fire, conversing cheerily. At least, on the outside. John was still much too miserable, though for the sake of his friends, he kept up the pretense that he was absolutely fine. Molly winced slightly at the mention of Sherlock's name, turning away to hide the brief show of emotion. Nobody else seemed to notice except John. As the memories passed on, John could see clearly how they became close. Every night, she'd swing by to discuss the day's news with him, talk about her day, share a drink, then leave. After a while, this grew into a routine. Molly, after a while, would say she'd really be needing to head on home, but John would detain her by asking her to stay. There was always a small hint of loneliness in his voice, a hint that even Molly Hooper could detect.  
There had been one chilly night both parties dared not to speak aloud about. It had been a Friday night, in January, Molly walking in, shrugging off her coat.  
"John, you wouldn't happen to have any wine on you, do you? I need a drink." She said, voice sounding weary from a dismal day of examining dead bodies. John directed her to the kitchen, pouring them both a glass of white wine. As the night wore on, their tete a tete became much more intimate. Molly brought out a CD she had bought earlier on her way to 221b Baker Street. She inserted the disk into the stereo she had given to him a few months prior as an early birthday present. Soon, soft music filled the room. Molly began to sway in time to the song, one John did not recognize. He watched as Molly danced, hair swishing back and forth.

"A falling star fell from your heart.  
It landed in my eyes.  
I screamed aloud...  
As it tore through them..." John had found himself stumbling closer, drink in hand.  
"Molly," he breathed, voice suddenly low. She turned to face him but was swept up in a flurry of kisses. At first, she tried to resist him. But after a few seconds, the wine settled in, and passion had clouded her eyes. She reciprocated the kisses with a surprising amount of enthusiasm.

"The stars...the moon,

They have all been blown out.  
You left me in the dark.  
No dawn, no day.  
I'm always in this twilight..." There had been more stumbling and fumbling with buttons and zippers.  
"...In the shadow of your heart." Somewhere in the midst of their passion, the wine glass had slipped from John's grasp, shattering carelessly on the floor. Neither one had noticed. John, in his hazy memory, remembered carrying Molly to his bedroom, slamming the door behind them both. Everything from there was a blur of frenzied heat.

"And in the dark...  
I can hear your heartbeat.  
I tried to find the sound...  
…..No dawn...no day...  
I'm always in this twilight..."

Afterward, when they both lay there in placid contentment, letting the moonlight enshrine them, Molly whispered to John, "Don't tell Sherlock."  
The words had been so simple. Their meaning...not so simple. John sighed, staring at the ceiling as he replied to her guilt-filled words, "Don't worry. I won't." They both knew their friend was in a place where he would never know, and yet... there was still the overwhelming guilt to be felt. This guilt overshadowed all facts.  
"...In the shadow of your heart."

* * *

"John! John!" Opening his eyes, the aforementioned army Doctor could make out a blur of brown and red. He blinked a couple of times before his vision focused. John was startled to find the Doctor leaning over him, about to do CPR. He gave a strangled yell.

"Relax." the Doctor chuckled. "I'm not going to hurt you."

"But..but you're an alien..." John mumbled, hardly comprehending anything.

"True. But in my eyes, and know that they've seen a _lot_ of things, you are the alien. Now, hold still. I've got to check for any possible concussions or lacerated contusions." John yelped when his hair was gripped with about as much care as a donkey.

"Wait. I'm a Doctor too."

The Doctor smiled. "I know, but it's standard procedure." John's hair was tugged a couple of times (quite roughly) before the Doctor was finally satisfied. He jumped to his feet, straightening out his bowtie. John simply stared at him.

"You're fine," the Doctor told him, an annoyingly condescending tone in his voice. "In fact, I'd say you were brilliant."

"But?" John struggled to his feet.

"Except, that'd be a bit of a contradiction, considering I'm the brilliant one here." And there it was: the same manic arrogance that had the same twinkle effect in the eyes, the way it had been with Sherlock when he deduced something. Which was nearly always.

"An arrogant alien. What next? Dancing fairies?" John muttered, following the Doctor to his console. His head throbbed, but it was more or less alright.

The Doctor checked his monitor once again, reading something off of it. "No," he said to John, eyes glued to the screen. "Sadly not. But we can, if you want, go see them after we pick up Molly." John almost gasped aloud in shock.

"M-Molly?" Finally, the Doctor turned to face him.

"Yes, Molly." Again, that irritating tone that made John feel as if he were five. "Molly Hooper. You know. Your girlfriend."

"Girlfriend? Look, you've got this all wrong. Molly and I-"

"...are just friends? Right. Sure. That wasn't what I was told." John, at this point, was ready to strangle the Doctor. Alien or not, he was annoying.

"Doctor, I don't know who you think you are, but you can't just imply-"

"I'm not implying." The Doctor retorted. "I'm simply stating the facts. Now, if you don't mind, I've got a human to fetch." He sauntered past an enraged John, smirking as he did so.

"You're welcome to come along." The alien pushed open the doors, white light filling the room. Street lights. As the Doctor left, John couldn't help but think a few nasty thoughts about him. But the moment passed, and his head cleared. Despite being utterly puzzled by this inscrutable figure, with his 'bigger-on-the-inside box' (he was still trying to get his head wrapped around that impossibility) John sighed malcontentedly, deciding to follow the alien. Whatever was awaiting him, seemed like a not-so pleasant situation. Especially with Molly Hooper involved.

"She's not my bloody girlfriend," John muttered, as he stormed out into London's quiet streets.


	3. Rain and Light

**A/N: Hey there. Sorry about the long update. I promise I'll make up for this relatively short chapter soon! Thanks for readin':)**

Molly Hooper grimaced as the water droplets fell from the sky. She glanced up dismayed to see dark grey clouds overhead.  
"Great," she muttered, tugging on the collar of her jacket, wanting to keep as dry as possible. "just what I needed." A few minutes passed by before the downpour really began. Molly, before everything in her life had slowly started to deteriorate, had loved the rain. She had loved the sound of it, the feel of it, even the smell of it. To her, rain represented everything dark about the world. The reason why she loved it was that after every rainfall, there were rainbows and bright sunlight. Hope was always there. But then there was the Fall. After that ordeal, everyday seemed like a rainy day.  
"Why so glum, Molly?" A voice said somewhere behind her. Molly gasped, startled beyond comprehension.  
"W-who's there?" she stammered, clutching her racing heart. Before the mysterious entity could answer, Molly was suddenly surrounded by a pair of very strong arms. She knew without thinking who those arms belonged to.  
"John!" she sighed, relieved.  
"Hi," came his all too familiar voice. "Don't worry. Everything's fine." Perhaps it was the warmth of his words and the sincerity behind it, or the sudden desire to quench the burgeoning fear inside her that made Molly act so rashly. Whatever it was, it certainly had a profound effect upon poor John Watson. Quick as the flash of lightning, Molly spun around to face him and eagerly planted her lips over John's, taking him by surprise. John staggered backward, uncertain of the appropriate way to respond to the situation. Molly, in all her experience in love, had been very unfortunate. She had the reckless habit of falling head over heels in love _very _quickly and of all the relationships she had been in, none ended on amaible terms. Like the previous times, Molly Hooper had fallen in love again.  
John felt himself lose himself in the kiss, even though his mind rebelled against it.  
'Stop!' he mentally berated himself. 'This is Molly! Molly!' John struggled with it, until thoughts became fuzzy and eventually, he lost himself altogether in it.  
"Oi! Don't I register in those funny little brains of yours?" Molly broke off the kiss, staring blindly around.  
"There it is again. That voice!" She whispered, afraid again. "Who are you?"  
"The Doctor!"  
"The Doctor? Where _are _you?" Molly peered hopelessly about, fruitless in locating the source of the voice. What was going on? Was she hearing things? As like Molly, John was also nonplussed, although for a completely different reason. The Doctor was standing right in front of them. Why couldn't Molly see him?  
"Listen, maybe you should-" John started before an orange light flashed, and he was left standing on the pavement grasping empty air.  
"Molly?"


	4. Molly's Tale

She had been gone for only a split second, and yet by the time she returned, she looked like she had been through hell and back. Molly's hair, once clean and orderly, was now unkempt and filthy. Her clothes were in similar condition, though in a much rougher state. They were torn in most places, and the colour in the fabric had faded to an almost greyish hue. But what really worried the Doctor and John was the fact that when she stumbled into John's arms again, she kept muttering under her breath "Sherlock...Sherlock...Sherlock..."

"Molly," the Doctor directed to her, kneeling at her side. "What happened to you?" Her eyes widened.

"Who said that?"

The Doctor sctrached his head, a thoughtful look coming into his features. "Right...:" he muttered to himself. "She still can't see me. Listen, Molly, it's the Doctor. You don't know me but-" Molly suddenly gave a shrill shriek, jumping back in apparant fright.

"Doctor! Doctor! Doctor... He said..." For some reason, the word 'Doctor' seemed to trigger some kind of pyschological response from Molly. As John cast a wary and careful glance at her, he realized that she was not the same person she had been a second before. Whatever had happened to her...it must have been _some _place. John laughed. His use of euphemism had always been horrid.

Molly glanced up at him in wonder. "Why are you laughing?" she croaked, sounding horribly dehydrated.

"Get her into the TARDIS." The Doctor immediately instructed, jumping to his feet in an almost inhuman agile move. "Now." John nodded, complying quietly.

"Doctor," he started once they had brought a shell-shocked Molly in. "Whatever has happened-"

"Hush. I'm thinking."

"But-"

"Hush!" The Doctor closed his eyes in an eerily familar way as plunged into a pit of thought.

"You sound just like him," John grumbled, turning to face Molly, who sat on the black couch at one end of the room. John was never one for acute observation, but in all of his time with Sherlock and their exploits performed together, he had picked up a thing or two. He noticed her tremble slightly and was instantly at her side. As he placed her hand in his and asking how she was, he heard the Doctor exclaim in a rather effusive manner, "Ah!" followed by the sound of running footsteps and the TARDIS doors slamming. Something was obviously afoot in the bowtie-wearing Doctor's mind.

"Listen...I know how mad all these seems..." John started, awkwardly gesturing to the room. "I mean, I can barely wrap my own head around it!" A strained laugh. "The Doctor, whoever he is, is-"

"John," Molly whispered, eyes closed. "I met Sherlock. He's alive." This piece of news startled John so, that he found himself incapable of speech. Taking his silence as a cue, Molly continued. "I...when...when I disappeared, I er..._ landed _in a very strange place. There was only the darkness... I thought I had died!" Tears sprang into Molly's eyes. "But then... there was this...electrical shock, and a voice asking who I was. Frightened, I told them."

"T-them?" John sqeaked, slowly finding his voice again.

Molly nodded in confirmation. "Yes. Them. There was another voice. They kept asking me questions about my life. If I didn't answer, they would shock me... I t-tried my best to answer them... After some time, I odn't know how long, they found out about Sherlock. And the instant they knew I was associated with him, there was a flash and I found myself at the edge of a high cliff." She shivered then, and overcome with a fierce protection towards her, John wrapped his arms around her once again. After a moment of comforting, she spoke again.

"It took me less than a second to realize that he was beside me. Sherlock. He looked the same. Almost exactly the same. As if he had never...Anyway, he stared straight past me, and in a soft voice said 'Molly, stay away from him.' I asked 'Who?' and he answered 'The Doctor. Stay away from him. He's a dangerous man. Not the kind of person you'd want your life to depend upon. _Stay away from him.' _As soon as he said the words, I felt someone push me off the cliff. Riht before impact, there was another flash and...well...I found myself...with you." When Molly had finished recounting her tale, John was poleaxed with an abrupt sense of alertness. Sherlock had warned Molly against the Doctor. He had said he was a dangerous man. But how dangerous? And how did Sherlock know the Doctor?

Not for the last time, John wondered what the hell was going on.

Both John and Molly jumped when the TARDIS doors opened with an abrupt 'BANG' and the Doctor came running in, a wild atmosphere around him. His eyes glittered, while his hair stuck up even more.

"Helllo, John. Hello, Molly. It's a shame you can't see me, 'cause you're going to want to when we land." The Doctor went to working at the controls, every so often murmuring a word of excitement.

John let go of Molly, assuring her he'd be right back, and walked over to the Doctor, demanding answers.

"You want answers," The Doctor said to him, smiling. John nodded. "Well, then. We mustn't wait. After all, there's no time like the present." He hit a button, sending the whole place in yet another frenzy. "Or the past. Or the future."

"Where are we going?!" John yelled, pulling himself toward Molly.

The Doctor gave a yell of appreciation, for, John had no idea.

"To where it all began!"


	5. Hope

His mind was like a closet. A very clean and orderly closet, mind you. Because, a closet can only be clean and orderly if everything is put in its proper place. The shirts and sweaters are hung up in a tidy juxtaposition, the pants stowed expertly away in drawers. Those were the building blocks of the mind.

But his though, his mind _used _to be like a closet. Nice and fine. Brilliant and bright. Impassive and powerful. But after the Fall, everything suddeny became random and cluttered, jumbled into one very unhealthy farrago. Calculations and deductions just weren't the same anymore. All he was now, was a scatterbrained...thing. Hopeless and confused. Disoriented in a world full of impossible things. Sherlock Holmes was no more than a mechanical thing deprived of sunshine for many months. Perhaps even years! Of course though, if he took into account his younger days, before John, he had always been deprived of sunshine. It was one of the many reasons for his cold demeanour. If he was no longer the expected genius everyone had once thought he was, then what was he? Sherlock Holmes: a man often referred to as someone arrogant, rude, cold, unfriendly, and even downright 'mad'. The problem with ordinary people, in Sherlock's personal opinion, was that they often chose to ignore the evidence right before their eyes. They were subjective people. A people of many odd and certainly _annoying _beliefs.

Darkness was the new sunlight now, and he was definitely getting it in abundance.

_Pain, _he concluded,

_Is the smell of dust after the rain. _

_It is a light not often turned on _

_But instead neglected and ignored. In hopes_

_that there is a brighter, and warmer one. _

_It is hateful and blissful_

_Turning even the most honourable men _

_into dirty beggars. _

_It watches you in the night_

_Tosses its high head at your fright_

_Scoffs and murders. _

_It rests at the feet of new green growth. _

_And the cracks of time_

_Be mine_

_Because pain makes it so._

Sherlock sighed in the blackness, mind heavy, heart weary. Depression, at its best, was the very epitome of all the bleak in life, and at its worst, was a beast that sinks its teeth, tomenting you for weeks and weeks on end, an indefatigable force to be reckoned with. At least, that was what he had heard. Not that he was depressed or anything. No. That would be absurd. He rubbed his temples, wanting to shoot something, in hopes of ridding himself of that ridiculous defeat.

"Please," he rasped. When had it been the last time he drank anything? "Please!" His only answer was the empty and echoing sounds of his voice. Sherlock wasn't ready to plunge into the depths of despair. He was above all that...wasn't he?

"PLEASE!" he screamed the words that time, reaching for the very heavens themselves. Come on... come on. They had to answer.

"Hush." came a prim, soft voice. "You are disturbing the children's rest."

"Children? What? You call _them_ children? They're beasts!"

"Of an extinct, ancient race. They're very precious to us...even if they are..._beasts._" There was a hint of amusement in the voice's tone. Sherlock gritted his teeth, ready to fight the world if he had to.

"Let me go. You've had your fun."

"True," the voice replied. "But look at you! You're one of a kind! You need to be preserved!"

"Preserved? I told you before! I am NOT your museum piece! Now, let me go! Or I swear I'll-"

"What?" it laughed. "What could you possibly do to us? Face it, you are trapped. There is no way out. You're under heavy guard, every waking hour, and every sleeping night. You're room is made of half dwarf star alloy and magnetised shield barriers. There is no escape. We are the Hitas. You belong to us now." There was a beep and suddenly there was no voice in the gloom. Sherlock groaned in anguish.

There really was no hope.


	6. Pain

_"Sherlock, are you okay?" At the other end of the line, John heard Sherlock say,"Turn around and walk back the way you came."_

_John almost laughed at the unusual order. Leave Sherlock? Ha!_

_"No, I'm coming in."_

_Sherlock's voice then seemed oddly disconnected, at least more so than usual. _

_"Just...Do as I ask. Please." Whatever was going on, it was obviously not pleasant. And that stint with Mrs. Hudson? What had that been all about? Why had he lied?_

_"Where?" John had reached the crossroad traffic area. He glanced around him in hopes of spotting Sherlock, desperate for some answers. His heart pounded furiously, as if acknowledging some terrible premonition. Something was definitely off._

_"Okay, look up. I'm on the rooftop."_

_John gulped, looking up. "Oh, God." What was that feeling? Fear? Why was his head suddenly banging?_

_"I-I-I can't come down so we'll just have to do it like this." Do what?_

_"What's going on?" 'Please, just answer for once Sherlock. Don't leave me in the dark.' John thought, panicked. 'And get the hell off that roof!'_

_Sherlock almost smiled. Almost. It was more of a rueful grimace than anything._

_"An apology." He answered calmly. "It's all true." _

_John didn't understand. "What?"_

_"Everything they said about me. I invented Moriarty." No. No, no. No. Not possible. Definitely NOT possible._

_"Why are you saying this?" It couldn't be possible. No. Because if it were, that would mean that all those times together solving those puzzles, and crimes, the laughs, the dangers... It would mean all of it was for nothing. _

_Sherlock uttered the words that threatened to tear John's world apart. _

_"I'm a fake." John responded immediatly with a, "Sherlock-" before his friend cut him off._

_"The newspapers were right all along. I want you to tell Lestrade, I want you to tell Mrs. Hudson and Molly. In fact, tell anyone who will listen to you. That I created Moriarty for my own purposes." Sherlock sighed into the phone. John was dumbstruck, yes, but he was also stubborn._

_"Okay, shut up." John was NOT going to let Sherlock suddenly step back in defeat. No. That was just not in his damn reperpoire. "The first time we met," Oh, that had been ages ago. "the first time we met, you knew all about my sister, right?"_

_"Nobody could be that clever." Idiot. He could. He could. _

_"You could." Sherlock smiled then. A cruel, sad smile that John instantly hated._

_"I researched you. Before we met. I discovered everything I could to impress you. It's a trick. It's just a magic trick. " That hint of bitterness at the end wasn't lost on John Watson. But the fact that Sherlock was a remarkable actor also wasn't lost on him either._

_"No. Alright, stop it now." This was getting ridiculous. Sherlock needed to stop pretending now. It wasn't funny anymore. John noticed the consulting detective inch closer to the edge, halting him in his tracks who had started forward._

_"No, stay exactly where you are. Don't move." John let out a strangled sigh, feeling more panicked by the second. _

_"Alright." He complied. Anything to get Sherlock away from that edge. Anything. Sherlock's eyes fixed on John's, rendering him incapable of looking anywhere else. _

_"Keep your eyes fixed on me." Sherlock said. As if he could look anywhere else! "Please, will you do this for me?"_

_"Do what?"_

_"This phone call, it's...it's my note. That's what people do, don't they? Leave a note?"_

_John muttered, "Leave a note when?" But he knew. Still...Sherlock...No. He just...no. Sherlock paused, a mounting tension tangible in the air. No...No..NO!_

_"Goodbye, John." Stop it Sherlock._

_"No, don't-"_

* * *

"I can't. I'm sorry. I just..." John turned away from the scene. The Doctor nodded understandably. They had travelled back to the moment of The Fall in order to get some answers. The Doctor reckoned that somewhere between the moment of Sherlock faking his death and after, he was kidnapped. (At least, that was what he kept telling John and Molly.) They were supposed to be looking for anything unusual, out of the ordinary. But the thing was, John's poor heart could only take so much of the pain.

"Go. I'll stay." John stumbled away, tears welling up in his eyes. He hastily wiped at them, not wanting to let anyone see him cry. All those months grieving over Sherlock...He didn't want to succumb to another one of those horrible moments. John wasn't an effusive person exactly; he was more repressive than anything. But witnessing his friend die twice...and hold the knowledge that he wasn't really dead but in fact trapped somewhere else (The Doctor had explained everything in the TARDIS), it did something to a person. Molly followed him, catching hold of his arm. He turned around to face her, eyes red and puffy. She held out her arms like a mother to her upset son, and John fell into them, wanting nothing more than to be comforted. They both were stood in an alley, rubbish strewn about them in no particular order.

"I'm sorry. It's just-" John began.

"Shhh." Molly said. "I know. And what do you have to apologize for? Crying? That's hardly a crime." She sounded uncharactistically confident and self-assured saying those words, John observed.

"Why is it that I break down and you're fine after everything that's happened to you?" Molly laughed.

"Who says I'm fine?" John glanced up. "When you're just a nobody friends with a whole whack of somebodies, you learn to hide your feelings."

"But why?" This new Molly...she was...compelling. What had happened to her?

Molly gave a rueful smile. "The somebody's feelings are more important than a nobody's."

"You're not a nobody." Molly's eyes met his and for a second, a split second, John caught a glimpse of the world that was Molly. It was nice.

"I'm sorry, for, well , about before." She said, snapping John out of it.

"For what?"

"I...All those months ago when we...erm... well..." a bit of the old nervous, fumbling Molly rose to the surface. "I just want to say I'm sorry."

John smiled. "You're sorry? Well, that's a shame. 'Cause I'm not." Molly's face brightened considerably. It was then that John knew he should kiss her. He was leaning in to meet his lips with her own when the Doctor ran into the alley announcing, "I've got a lead!"

John straightened up, nodding.

"Right. Let's follow it, then." He ran after the Doctor back to the TARDIS, Molly in tow. John looked back at Molly promising, "To be continued."

She laughed, grabbing his hand. "To be continued."


	7. Hate Me

They injected him with the stuff just minutes ago... and already he was delirious.

_'If you're sleeping are you dreaming_  
_If you're dreaming are you dreaming of me?_  
_I can't believe you actually picked me...'_

Somehow the thoughts had entered his mind. It was as if the mental guard he had put up had crumbled down in place of fallen ashes. Maybe that was just it. After all, he was no longer the same Sherlock Holmes. But what were these thoughts? These...voices in his head? Was he going mad?

_'I have to block out thoughts of you so I don't lose my head_  
_They crawl in like a cockroach leaving babies in my bed_  
_Dropping little reels of tape to remind me that I'm alone...'_

Oh, he was alone. But why now? Why did he have to go mad now? Why couldn't he stay sane and figure a way out? After all, he was clever. That's what he was supposed to do...figuring things out...right?

_'There's a burning in my pride, a nervous bleeding in my brain...'_

Please. Why did he have to suffer so? Why did he have to be so...so...arrogant? So indfferent? So...himself. What was wrong with him?

_'Hate me today..._  
_Hate me tomorrow..._  
_Hate me for all the things I didn't do for you...'_

Of all the times to be insecure...ha! Insecure...as if he was that. As if he hated every inch of himself for the weakness he now possessed. As if he was broken.

_'Hate me in ways_  
_Yeah ways hard to swallow_  
_Hate me so you can finally see what's good for you...'_

He couldn't help it. He missed him. John. His sunshine in the world full of darkness. Ugh. How cliche was that? But he did. he really did miss him. For some reason, he felt sorry. Sorry for all the times he had snapped at his friend, his only friend, the times he managed to disappoint...to anger...

_'While I was busy waging wars on myself, you were trying to stop the fight._  
_You never doubted my warped opinions on things like suicidal hate..._  
_You made me compliment myself when it was way too hard to take...'_

Where was John when he really needed him?


	8. Buttons

**A/N: IF I APOLOGIVED PROFUSELY, BEGGING ON MY KNEES, WOULD ANY OF YOU FORGIVE ME? SORRY ABOUT THE LONG ABSENCE. FOR THOSE STILL READING THIS, MY. BAD. LIFE KEPT PULLING ME AWAY TO DIFFERENT THINGS. BUT...I'M BACK! I made this chapter a bit longer than usual to make up for by absence. **

**If it wouldn't be too much, please read and review! I'd like to see what you all think!**

**READ ON! :)**

After the fall, the Doctor went and followed close behind every detail of every little event that ensued. Molly and John, however, chose to stay behind in the TARDIS. It was too painful for either of them to go out yet after witnessing the horrific 'death' of Sherlock Holmes twice.  
John was surveying an old record player that was somehow attached to the console of the TARDIS. What was it supposed to do? Play the 'odes of the universe' in case the Doctor ever got bored? Probably.  
Just days-or was it hours?- ago, he had been sitting at home in Baker Street, alone and withering away and suddenly, here he was...standing in the impossible. How had that happened?  
"The whole thing is just mad," he muttered to himself. John pressed a button, thinking it looked pretty harmless. And it was. At first.  
But then a loud noise boomed from the player. loud enough to blow out John's eardrums sky high. Startled out of his wits, John jumped back and immediately clapped his hands to his ears. It muffled the noise some.  
His hands searched recklessly for the 'off' button. _DAMN. Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn!_  
He was in near hysterics when Molly appeared, returning from her exploration of the TARDIS.  
"_Go ahead! There's lots to explore!" _she remembered him saying. Well, more like yelling, as he was in a bit of rush. To where, Molly had no idea, though he was right in the 'lots to explore department'. Her mind had been blown just by walking down the corridors. H-How? How was that all possible?  
Molly had a feeling that she had only just scratched the surface.  
"Hey," she said to John. He didn't answer. "John?" Silence. Well, at least as much silence as one could get with a loud, tumultuous noise ringing in one's ears. Molly sighed. Really?  
"JOHN!" He whipped around and found himself face to face with her. His face melted in relief at the sight of her.  
"Molly," he said. "I pressed a button, and-"  
"WHAT?" Now Molly was covering her own ears. There was a banging inside her head now.  
"I. PRESSED. A BUTTON." John explained over the ruckus but didn't get far when Molly rolled her eyes and pushed past him. Men. Molly glanced, panicked, at the miscalleanous buttons and levers. She gulped down the rising terror, and calmed herself (albeit with some difficulty).

"Okay. Which one did you press?" John's eyes bugged.

"I...don't...know." Molly gave him a good, 'I'll-kill-you-later' glare. She'd deal with him and his stupidity later. At the moment, she'd have to sort out _his _mess.

Oh. God. Which bloody button was it?

* * *

Standing over his grave, feeling the cool breeze swift through his hair, the Doctor silently wept. He knew there was no body in the grave; but that wasn't the point. The point was, he was grieving for a friend he never had the chance of grieving for.

The knowledge that somewhere out there, his friend, his ally, the most human man he had ever met, was alone in the dark thinking that nobody would come and save him...it filled him with an inexplicable sadness. Knowing Sherlock, he would probably insist that he didn't need saving-he wasn't that kind of person. He'd probably articulate why the idea of him being saved was such an impossible thing, that he was already fine without the unecessary, and abhorrent act...

He had told John and Molly that he was going to go visit the morgue. That was true-but he'd do it later. Receiving news of Sherlock's 'death' hadn't been easy. He had been travelling around with Amelia at the time, and he couldn't afford to be all sad and mopey. At the time, he had needed to be the crazy, ever-optimistic Raggedy Man. She had been so young. He couldn't let her see the pain.

After they...After New York, he had decided to go and visit Sherlock's grave. But the TARDIS had sent him someplace way off from his entered coordinants. He'd ended up on another planet. At first, he had been aggravated. Why had the old girl taken him there? Why? She must've known his intended destination. Why the detour? But after a second of annoyance, he noticed the planet he was on. The Ood Sphere.

Ood Sphere. Vaguely, he recalled the last time he had been there.

"_Set the controls to random. Mystery tour! Outside that door could be any planet, anywhere, anywhen, in the whole wide— Are you all right?"_

_"Terrified. I mean history's one thing, but an alien planet!" Donna's eyes were as wide as a goldfish's. Were goldfish's eyes wide? He couldn't remember._

_"I could always take you home." He didn't actually mean it. He loved Donna. Mad, and a tiny bit annoying sometimes, but he loved her. _

_"Yeah, don't laugh at me."_

_He smiled. He could see the trepidation in her eyes. But he could also see the burning curiosity, the wonder, the wanderlust. _

_"I know what it's like. Everything you're feeling right now. The fear, the joy, the wonder, I get that!"_

_..._

_"Millions of planets, millions of galaxies and we're on this one. Molto bene! Belissimo! Says Donna. Born in Chiswick. All you've got is a life of work and sleep, and telly and rent and tax and takeaway dinners, all... birthdays and Christmases and two weeks holiday here, and then you end up here! Donna Noble. Citizen of the Earth, standing on a different planet. How 'bout that Donna?"_

But times had changed since that moment. Like the Ponds, she was irretrievably gone. It was best to move on.

The sphere. Despite the different face and atttire, the Oods had welcomed him as if he hadn't changed at all. Cheerfully, he visited them, and all was well. At least, until one of the Oods had told him.

It had been one called 'Spera', an ancient word for hope. Ood Spera had given him back the hope-he guessed that what was why he was called 'Spera' in the first place. Nice name for an equally nice Ood.

Sherlock was alive. Alive. ALIVE! Immediately, he raced back to his box and set the controls to London, Earth. That time, the TARDIS had broght him there. He didn't need to be pyschic to get the message.

Since then, he had whisked John, and of course, Molly too, off in search of a living memory.

But he stood there on the short clipped grass, immobile. Everybody knew that everybody died...even himself. And yet, even with that bittersweet piece of knowledge retained in his vast mind, the loss and the bereavement were still as fresh and painful as the first time.

It seemed he couldn't keep from losing people. Everytime. Every _damn _time.

_'Don't talk...Don't say a thing..._

_'Cause your eyes, they tell me more than your words...'_

"Sherlock..." The Doctor muttered, penetrating the eerie silence. Overhead, the sky was cast a gloomy grey. "Where are you? Where are you?" The tears blurred his vision. He was glad-he didn't think he could face seeing the name engraved on the stone.

'_And I am short on words..._

_Knowing what's occurred...'_

Crying was silly; it was absurdly human. And yet...he continued to cry. He had to grieve. He had to. Experience taught him that if, he John and Molly, ever succeeded in rescuing Sherlock from wherever he had been taken to, he'd emerge a different man. He wouldn't be the same. So, in a way, Sherlock would have died. He acknowledged the truth, ripping the bandaid off the wound.

_'Stay still until you know..._  
_Tomorrow finds the best way out is through...'_

He was dealing with it; he had been through to know that much. But John and Molly... Sooner or later, he'd have to tell them. They deserved to know.

The Doctor wiped at his eyes and straightened. It was time to quit fooling around. A friend needed him. He glanced down one last time at the grave. For some reason, he nodded. It was like he was saying goodbye to a ghost. He could picture vividly Sherlock smirking, and saying, "How sentimental."

Humans had a knack for it. That was what made them so fabulously _human, _even if Sherlock pretended otherwise. The idiot.

'_Stay until you know...'_

Sometimes, just sometimes, the Doctor did too.

_'Tomorrow finds the best way out is through.'_

Right then. Time to investigate.


	9. Snogs and Scorn

He entered the building only to realise that perhaps the best idea would be to go back to the time, in his TARDIS of course, when they had brought Sherlock in. But, after a beat he questioned it. He didn't normally travel that way-and besides, whoever took Sherlock would have probably made entering that particular time impossible, or near impossible. The Doctor had concluded that the detective-nappers (ha-ha) were smart. They had to be. The time they had taken Sherlock was no coincidence-it was at a time when everyone who knew him was saying goodbye to him. It was at a time when no one would notice that he had disappeared-for, in people's hearts and minds, he had already been taken from them. Or at least, in John and Molly's.

He had read the papers. He knew what they had said about them. And they were all liars, preparing to rest their cases against the known rather the unknown. They were afraid, that much was blatant, but it didn't mean they had to go about spreading around false lies.

Was he angry? Yes. Sherlock was his friend. No one, under any circumstances, no matter how terrified they all were, got away with attacking his friends. Okay. So maybe 'attack' was a bit harsh. But was it? Was it really? He knew the entire history of the human race, and knew that humans weren't always innocent. In the past, they had done terrible things simply in order to be right. Sometimes...

Still. His mind rounded back to that first thought. He'd give it a try. What did he have to lose?

"Companionship, a long-lost friend...dignity..." he muttered under his breath. Right. Dignity. Maybe he could afford to lose that. _But..._a petulant voice whined. _I like dignity. _And, as an afterthought, it added, _Bowties **are **cool._

He became suddenly cheerful.

* * *

Molly and John had escaped to someplace other than the console room in that mad blue box, Molly grumbling along the way.

"No offense, but I kind of always thought you were a bit of an idiot," she muttered under her breath.

"Idiot? _Me? Idiot?_"

"Yes. Weren't you listening?"

"Hang on. You never said anything about that before." They both inherently knew what 'before' meant. It meant everything that had happened _before _things had gone downhill, before Sherlock took that fall.

"Yeah, well, Sherlock did all that for me, didn't he?" Molly retorted. Her head was still banging from that bloody noise John had managed to cause.

"Oh. Oh. That's rich. That's very rich. You, Molly Hooper, of all people..." He trailed off.

"What? What? Just because I think you're an idiot... Sherlock, he said that to you all the time. He was right. IS right. Is right..."

For a couple of minutes, they walked in silence, peering curiously at the TARDIS corridor walls. Blue. Of course. Molly found them strangely alluring; the patterned circles on the walls reminded her of the interior of a pocket watch.

John couldn't stand the silence. In the distance, they could both hear the distant screeches of his mistake. It wasn't his bloody fault.

"Look, I didn't mean to press that button. I was curious! You would've done the same!"

Molly laughed. "No! I wouldn't have! The Doctor said to not touch anything, and what do you do, you go and touch something! Stop bringing it up!"

"It wasn't my fault!"

"Yes, it was!"

"No. It was _not. _You don't need to overreact-" She whirled to face him in the empty corridor.

"Overreact? I'm not overreacting. I think _you're _the one overreacting. I take my eye off you for one moment, and suddenly-" John kissed her. He couldn't help it. She just looked so damn cute when she was annoyed...

Molly broke off, glaring at him. "If...you...think..." She planted her mouth on his and deepened the kiss. Her eyes closed, she imagined them on a beach somewhere. She didn't know why. It just popped in her head. John's hands were at her waist, pulling her gently to him. She smirked. Gentle wasn't exactly her style anymore.

Grinning, Molly pushed John back against the wall, delighted at the look of surprise on his face.

"Molly?" But she could see the small grin forming. They continued to kiss, everything forgotten but the taste of each other. John's hands tugged at her shirt. He slid it up a few inches, cautious, but Molly didn't seem to mind. So he continued further.

It was when they were pressed up against each other on the wall did a figure appear beside them. John was the first to notice.

"Ah!" he jumped. A woman stood in front of them, tall and red-readed. She looked cross. Molly glanced up.

"What's wrong?"

"Um," John mumbled. "look behind you." So she did. And was scared out of her wits.

"S-sorry. Um...John..." He noticed he still had his hand up her shirt, cupping her bra. Embarrassed, he pulled away. The woman continued to stare at him. For a brief second, she shifted out of sight, then reppeared again almost like a hologram. What the hell?

"Sorry," John said. "but who are you?"

She opened her mouth, but all John could hear was a bunch of techno babble.

"What?"

She gave an exasperated sigh. "Does he need to choose the dull ones?"

"Oi. What was that?"

The woman ignored him, and instead proceeded to answer his forst question, in a more...simplistic way.

"I am the TARDIS voice visual interface. I chose this face as the one that would best fit for scolding. Oh, I liked her." For a moment, she smiled. Her eyes glowed with long-passed moments. But the moment soon passed and she took on a rather terrifying expression.

"Oi. No snoggin' in my corridors. A thousand years of travellin' through time and space, and do ya think I ever allowed such a thing? I tolerated you two in the bedroom, by the way, which I had to soundproof just to get rid of the awful ruckus..." On and on she ranted. Her accent was distinctive. Molly recognized it was one would have hailing from Chiswick. She had a cousin living there. They weren't close. Molly suspected that he hated her.

"...so, no. I won't allow ya to go and-"

"Ahhh! Molly! John! What the hell did you two do?" Both their eyes widened at the Doctor's yells. He sounded closer with each passing second. Uh-oh.

"Molly," John whispered to her, grabbing hold of her hand. The TARDIS visual whatsit continued to rant. "I think we should run."

"Agreed." With the Doctor in sight at the end of the corridor and a hologram screaming bloody hell at them, Molly and John ran. Glancing behind his shoulder, John grinned when he saw the Doctor stop and give a second-look at the woman. She had stopped yelling. In fact, she almost appeared...bashful. He laughed.

_'I could do with more days like this,' _he thought.


	10. Problems

Once the mess with the TARDIS acting as Donna was sorted, the Doctor rounded on Molly and John.

"Oi. You two. What were you doing in the corridors anyway that made the old girl scold you both?" Molly and John shared gleeful glances. The Doctoro was definitely one to miss the obvious.

"Well?" The Doctor sighed. "Look. If you're gonna travel with me-"

"But we're not though." John said. "We're just helping you look for Sherlock and bring him back to London." A silent tension between them suddenly emanated. It was as if all the warmth from the room dropped by a few degrees.

"I didn't...I wasn't...What I meant..." Trying to articulate himself may as well have been as easy as climbing one the moving mountains of Helga. They swayed when you touched it.

Molly could see the desperation in his ancient eyes. She stepped forward.

"We know what you meant. Don't worry. You're just as worried about Sherlock as we are. And," she added, in a slightly teasing manner. "you must be an alien not to guess what we were doing."

The Doctor's cheeks reddened. Right. Well, time to face the music.

"What? _Are _you an alien?"

"In my view _you're _the alien. But, I suppose in your case, I am." He smiled. Molly frowned.

"Alien? But...I thought you were just someone..." now she wasn't the only one with reddened cheeks. "You know. From the future."

"Oh, I am! Well, sort of. Not really. I guess you can say I exist in all times. I haven't really gave it much thought. I mean, being a time traveller and all-"

John marvelled at the man. He knew he was an alien but...The Doctor was a bowtie wearing, time travelling alien. Huh. It made sense in an oddly ridiculous way. It was the chin, he reckoned. The chin was what really distinguished him from the human race. After all, nobody human would possess a chin like that! And he started giggling. At first, it was nondescript, background noise-filler as the Doctor rambled on to Molly something about cheese or whatever. But then it escalated into full blown hysterics. Molly and the Doctor turned to him. Their puzzled expressions only made him laugh much more harder.

"What?"

John spluttered through the giggles, "The chin...it's...it's the...bloody...chin." The last word propelled him further in the manical fit, spurring the Doctor to self-consciously touch his chin.

"Chin?" he muttered. Molly was finally hit with a revelation. All of sudden she started laughing too.

"What? What is it? Have I got a bogey hanging?" Worried, he checked. Nope. What then? "Oi. Stop it. Stop it. Stop. I'll veer the TARDIS off course and into a volcano. Well, no. I won't. But still. You get the point. Stop it. Fine. You know what? How about I leave you too here and-' But before he could finish his unfinished lame threat, the whole place gave a violent shudder. John and Molly immediately sobered up. Despite himself, the Doctor smirked.

"That's odd..." he muttered.

John rolled his eyes. "And the sky's blue. Yeah. Tell us something we don't know."

"Oi. Watch your tongue. As pilot of this magnificent box, I-"

"Jesus. I'm not a child."

"Compared to my age you are."

"I don't give a bloody-"

"HEY!" John and the Doctor's heads turned to Molly. She looked overly annoyed.

"Would you quit it already with your petulant fights? Something's obviously wrong. We don't have time for arguing. Sherlock's somewhere out there and the more time we waste, the farther away he gets." _And, _she added silently, knowing full well what it was like in the horrid darkness. _He'll get more and more miserable. _"So shut up and get over your differences. Understand?"

Scared out their wits, they nodded.

"Good. Now, come on." She led the way down the corridor, back up the way to the Console room.

"You know, just as a passing remark, time is _not _the boss of you and-" Molly glared at him. He fell silent.

When they arrived, the scanner was bleeping in mad turmoil. The Doctor ran to it. His eyes widened in surprise.

"That's not possible..."

"What?" John asked sullenly. He still wanted a word or two with the him.

"We've hit bit of a snag. A bump in the road, A-"

"GET ON WITH IT."

The Doctor scratched his head. "Right. Well...2011. The year Sherlock jumped off that rooftop..."

Molly was growing impatient. "What about it?"

"We just bounced off it."

"Wait? What? Bounce off? What are you blabbering on about?" This time it was John who spoke.

"The year...the TARDIS bounced off it. We can't, I hate using this term, 'get in'. It's impossible."

Molly, understandbly, was confused. "Before...in the corridor. You said that you'd veer the TARDIS off course."

"I was annoyed. Like I'd actually-"

"Was 2011 our destination?" An uncomfortable look shifted across the Doctor's face.

"Yes. I mean, we were already in it, just a few months after the fall. I only wanted to travel back to when they brought his body in the morgue. But apparently that's not gonna happen."

"Can't you try something? You're a time travelling alien after all." Molly gave the Doctor a small smirk. For a moment, he wasn't sure if she was right. In his past, a lot of people had put their faith in them and more than once he had failed them. But perhaps not this time. This was Molly Hooper and John Watson after all, friends of the great Sherlock Holmes. His eyes lit up with a new determination.

"Alright. I'll see what I can do-" He pulled a lever, but was thrown backwards when the old girl got all funny again. The entire console shook violently, as if about to vomit. From the corner of his eye he could see Molly grasping John by the arm, preventing him from falling over the railing. The TARDIS spun out of control. It zipped, it zagged, it whirled and twirled. Eventually he felt sick.

"Sexy..." he muttered. "What's wrong, dear?" The the console whirred angrily in response, giving another frightening jolt. It was minutes before the they finally landed.

Almost immediately, the TARDIS began shutting down.

"Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO!" The Doctor yelled, throwing himself at the console. He tried everything he could to reverse the process but every effort of his was all for naught. The cold, empty air around the three was unnerving.

"Doctor..." John sat up, rubbing his head. Evidently, he had fallen. "Where are we?"

The Time Lord gulped nervously. Nervous? He was never nervous. At least, he never _appeared _nervous. He met John's worried gaze. He had to tell him. He had to, If he didn't, he'd risk their all their lives. He wasn't about to let them die. No. Never them.

"I..." The words, for once, didn't come easily. It was like there was a rock in his throat, preventing him from uttering the horrible words. "I...honestly don't know. That's new."


	11. 1875

How could she put the words onto the paper? How? How could see, Jane Austen, barely a girl making it in the world, find the inspiration to create the magic that readers loved so much? How? How could she do it? After all, she was just an ordinary girl. She loved to write, but...but nothing. The words weren't as easy to grasp this time around.

Jane sighed malcontentedly. She blew out the candle she was using as a light source to write by and fell back onto her bed. Love, as they said, was not a simple thing to just write about. It had to be experienced to create the right words for her characters. The characters...Jane smiled fondly to herself. She couldn't help it; they burst out of her head and onto the paper...into the world. They were more than just characters now. They were...

Something odd occurred then. A blaring, barely endurable noise sounded from all around the room and before Jane had time to react a big blue box crash-landed at the corner of the room, destroying the entire backwall, and not to mention the ceiling. Jane glanced up. Eh. The ceiling often leaked when it rained-perhaps this would spur her father in finally fixing it.

"Out! Out! Out! Out!" Someone shouted from, remarkably, inside the box. Jane backed up against the wall and stared in amazement as three people, two men and a woman, stumbled out.

"Doctor...where are we?" the shorter man, and in Jane's opinion the more handsome one, asked.

"I.." the taller one coughed. "told you. I don't know. But by the looks of it, from the wood-panelled walls and the..." the shorter fellow and his companion had noticed Jane by now. Not wanting to be rude, she smiled. The woman returned the smile, but after a brief second of hesitation. For some reason, she looked shocked to see Jane. There was amazement in her eyes when she stared at her.

"...which, I'll have to admit is pretty cool, I'd say it's the late ninteenth century. But I can never be too sure about these things. You know, once upon a time, I accidentally landed in Henry the eighth's wedding, and a friend of mine said yes to his vows. Accidentally, of course. But the whole thing," he laughed. "was a disaster. So, the Ponds, my friends, had to-"

The woman interrupted the rambling man. Jane rather liked him, although she did have to admit his dress sense was...preculiar at most.

"Doctor."

"...and anyway, I eventually got them back home, all was well, except it wasn't. There was an invasion of the very small cubes, long story, and we-"

"Doctor."

"Hm?" She nodded her head in Jane's direction. The man glanced at Jane briefly before returning his attention to the woman.

"What?" She nodded her head again.

"What? What is it?" The shorter one sighed.

"Doctor, look who's standing right in front of you." The 'Doctor' (_'Doctor Who?' _Jane thought) looked. It took him a second, but eventually he got it.

He smacked himself on the forhead. Once, twice, thrice.

"I am such an idiot!" he berated himself. "Oh, I _am _getting old." His gaze levelled with Jane's and she noticed something odd about them, though she couldn't put her foot on what exactly. He beamed.

"Hiya! It is an honour to meet you!" He grabbed hold of her hand and shook it violently to his companion's dismay."It's very, very good to meet you! How's it going? Oh! Sorry about the roof...ceiling...thing. My...er, box...anyway, sorry." He gave a rueful smile.

"Oh...that's...quite alright. My father's been meaning to fix it, actually. You just gave me a perfect excuse to remind him."

The 'Doctor' man laughed. He still clutched her hand in his.

"Oh...I forgot how funny you were..."

"Sorry?"

"Nah. Nevermind. So. What's the year?" The question threw Jane off. Was the man drunk or something?

"Are you alright?"

The man nodded with an uncontained vigor. "Oh, yes! Yes, yes, yes! I have never been more alright! Well, actually I have but anyway...What's the current year? I've been a little... forgetful these days," he swayed unsteadily on his feet. "Right. Would you mind telling me?"

Jane nodded. "Certainly. It's 1875."

"Month?" Now Jane really was concerned.

"December." The Doctor sighed romantically.

"Ah." He said, gazing at something unseen. This man was _odd. _"Romance."

"Sorry?"

"Nothing. Hey, do you mind if we stay here for a bit? As you can see my..um...box is a bit...you know. We, that is, me, old Johnnie boy," the shorter one rolled his eyes. "and Molly here have nowhere else to go. So, would you? I mean, can we?"

Jane was dumbstruck. Absentmindedly, she heard herself say, "Of course." The man smiled broadly, and gestured for the other two to leave the room. He waved.

"Goodnight, Jane! And thanks!" He left the room then. A few minutes later, there was a banging noise followed by someone muttering, "Ouch!"

Jane surveyed the room. It was quite the mess. Well, obviously, it would all have to be cleaned up. But first... Jane grabbed a blank sheet of paper and starting writing with a ferocity that she had never felt before. Inspiaration, as they said, came at the oddest of moments.


End file.
